TV #25 of 2017: The West Wing, season 5 This show never quite gets bad during its run, but this season is probably the closest it gets (which makes it all the more surprising that 5×17 The Supremes is one of the show’s all-time best episodes). Josh’s annoying intern is a big part of the …
Author Archives: Joe Kessler
Book Review: Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear
Book #140 of 2017: Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winspear (Maisie Dobbs #1) I mostly liked this novel, but it has a decidedly odd structure: the first third of the book introduces readers to private investigator Maisie Dobbs as she’s solving a case, the middle third shows an extended flashback of Maisie’s childhood as a maid …
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Book Review: The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden
Book #139 of 2017: The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden (Winternight Trilogy #1) There’s a beautiful atmosphere to this book that really makes you feel like you’re caught up in a snowy Russian fairy tale. I found I cared more about that sense of rich Slavic folklore than I did about the characters …
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Book Review: Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Book #138 of 2017: Every Other Day by Jennifer Lynn Barnes Every Other Day is the story of a teenage girl with Buffy-like powers, but only on alternating days. (In between, she’s as human as the next high schooler.) That’s a fun hook, but the story beats were fairly predictable and I had a hard …
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TV Review: Doctor Who, season 10
TV #24 of 2017: Doctor Who, season 10 Not as great as season 9, which was a real series high for the show, but still really quite good. Bill was an absolute gem, and I liked that the season finale left her fate open enough that she could plausibly either return or not, based on …
Book Review: A Taste of Honey by Kai Ashante Wilson
Book #137 of 2017: A Taste of Honey by Kai Ashante Wilson There are some truly lovely moments throughout this book, and its interracial gay love story is a real breath of fresh air for the fantasy genre. But the disjointed chronology didn’t work for me, and I felt like there were so many missing …
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TV Review: Sense8, season 2
TV #23 of 2017: Sense8, season 2 I have the most mixed feelings about Sense8. On the one hand, it’s like no other television show out there, and I feel like it gets at some really profound truths about living in a networked society where your friends around the globe can be there for you …
TV Review: iZombie, season 3
TV #22 of 2017: iZombie, season 3 I really love the way iZombie’s seasons are self-contained storylines – creator Rob Thomas has likened them to books in a series – that inevitably blow up their premise in the finale to set up a brand-new status quo for the next season to dig into. The fallout …
Book Review: Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis
Book #136 of 2017: Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis (The Space Trilogy #1) While not as instantly endearing as his Narnia books, there’s still a lot to enjoy in this first volume of C. S. Lewis’s space trilogy, which could have easily been titled A Linguist of Mars. For although Lewis …
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Book Review: Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence
Book #135 of 2017: Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D. H. Lawrence This book was way more graphic than I expected or wanted, so I’m not surprised it produced such outrage when it was first published in 1928. There’s a bit of a plot regarding female empowerment happening in and around the sex, but the novel …
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The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more 